Sunday I went early to church to see a member of an earlier ward, and then sat in my pickup finishing the lesson preparation for my 11-year-old Primary class.  With the front of my pickup nosed into the bushes that line the east fence of the parking lot, I became aware of rustlings in the dry leaves, and of the soft noises that quail make as they talk to one another.

Presently a cock quail hopped up onto the top rail of the chain link fence directly in front of me.  He looked all about, and made the soft quail sounds in his throat that told his companions below that all was well.  A car went by in the parking lot, and I could hear traffic and a car horn a couple of blocks away.  The little cock quail took note of these things, but kept up the “all’s well” sound in his throat.  Inside the church a couple of hundred people were carrying on a variety of human activities.  On three sides of the quail a busy town was carrying on its activities.  On the quail’s fourth side was a busy street that linked a highway with the freeway which was less than a mile away.

Despite being surrounded by frenetic human activity the covey of quail went peacefully about their quail business.  They were aware of the human activity, and kept one or another of their members on duty to watch for any danger, but were living their lives peacefully and apart from the silly and meaningless things the humans were doing.

They were in the world, but not of the world.  They had a world of their own.  The human world, for the most part, didn’t even know of their existence, and the quail paid only as much attention to the human world as was necessary to keep themselves from danger.  Two worlds were in operation side by side, and neither paid heed to the other.

I then turned my attention to the 200 people in the church.  That was another world within the world.  The people in the church were as peaceful and content with their world as the quail were with theirs.  They, too, had the necessity of keeping a watchful eye on the other world because it presents some real dangers; but they were as peaceful and apart from the silly, meaningless and destructive things of the larger world as were the quail.  I had the sensation that though the larger world might tear itself apart, the quail and the saints could quietly keep going about their happy business.